Is Your Life Delay-Driven or Purpose-Driven?
Delay. Many of us are grand masters in this approach. We sit and hold our cards refusing to play or fold. We stand on the diving board anxiously waiting to jump in or for someone to push us off.
Delay can be good; delay can be bad. Today, I have one purpose for this writing. It is to perform a life-prolonged delay. I'm not sure how an everyday writer, who writes columns for everyday people who read everyday newspapers can do this.
Here goes…my delayed purpose is to write a poem. Let me assure you, there will be no tears shed over this poem. It will not take your breath away or have you searching for vague meanings. (I know…I'm still delaying.) I call my poem “The Morning Mystery.”
Silence is broken.
Dawn is near.
Sometimes it's even and clear
When silence is broken.
Sometimes my morning silence is startled
Awakening my sleeping fear.
The broken silence is always near.
Actually, it's quite dear.
It's annoying. It's my friend.
It's funny. It's boring.
It's my husband's snoring!
Now some of you might smile and say, “That's good.”
Many others will shake their head and mumble, “No rhyme or meter. That's bad…sincerely bad!”
Could this knowledge of a new purpose in writing for me be both good and bad? Is it possible for “good” and “bad' to simply hold hands and walk together?
How can this work? Well, for me it became good because I followed through my purpose to write a poem. It was bad because writing one poem does not a poet make: specifically a poet who has no clue what rhyme and pulse are…much less conquering it.
So, How can bad become the friend of good? This question is answered out of my on experiences.
At times, we find ourselves in deep troubled water…that's bad; but the current of His love sweeps us home…that's good. Other times, we become weary or wounded…that's bad; then and there, He begins the healing process of wholeness…that's good.
More than one time, the festering of suspicions and secrets consume us…that's bad; yet, His involvement in our lives turns this festering into the wellness of honesty and openness and forgiveness…that's good. This is when we feel the good and bad of our lives holding His hand as they walk together. He is the one in the middle.
My final delayed purpose in writing is to one day create a sweet story punctuated with lots of quotation marks marching boldly though my story. That will be the hardest purpose to reach. I'm not a marching writer; I'm a strolling writer.
For fifteen years I have written and strolled through your lives as weary newspaper readers on Saturday mornings. Many of you are strolling and struggling with common problems day after day.
You have always challenged my writing to meet your needs. That is my exclusive purpose in writing: to put some good on tired lives; to help you perceive the “goods” and the “bads” of life as they learn to clasp hands and become friends.
Finally the greatest use of quotation marks was spoken over 2,000 years ago when our Lord said, “Come unto me all you who are tired and weary. I will give your rest.”
God's great purpose to bring His children home is not being delayed in this day and age. I have this on good authority. His brief words from the cross resound in my heart, “It is finished.” (His divine purpose.)
P.S. Today, I too am finished being a poet and “fretting” over quotation marks. The End.
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